


before I let you walk, you gotta show me how you crawl

by Jsscshvlr



Category: Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), Spider-Man - All Media Types
Genre: Enemies to Lovers, Explicit Language, Explicit Sexual Content, Identity Reveal, Light Angst, Peter Parker is a thot, Porn with Feelings, Thotumn, okay so they're enemies for about four seconds okay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-16
Updated: 2020-11-16
Packaged: 2021-03-09 18:33:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 21,799
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27590735
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jsscshvlr/pseuds/Jsscshvlr
Summary: “It was just an accident.” He manages to blurt out, which he’s pretty happy with because all of the thoughts in his head are pinned on the drip of alcohol running down her neck. He follows it till it dips below her neckline and shit, he’s definitely staring. May would be mad.“Accident or not, you can still legitimately apologise without checking me out. Asshole.” He chokes on nothing while trying to figure out how he fucked it up so bad.
Relationships: Michelle Jones/Peter Parker
Comments: 41
Kudos: 78
Collections: Peter Parker's Thotumn 2020





	before I let you walk, you gotta show me how you crawl

**Author's Note:**

> Welp. Don't look at me x

**Peter**

Peter loves Ned. He’s his best friend, always has been always will be. But he likes him a little less right now. Now he’s made a bumbling idiot out of himself in front of the hottest girl he’s ever seen. Truly, it’s not entirely Ned’s fault -but having someone else to pin it on makes his fuck up somehow seem less monumental. 

You see, Peter had to navigate the party with four drinks, which yeah, he’s Spiderman so it shouldn’t be a problem. But then he saw her and he stopped in his tracks, completely bowled over by how attractive he found her. Probably would have been a good idea not to stop in the flow of heavy traffic. Probably would have been good to have used his senses to pick up on the fact that someone was about to bump into him sending all four of his drinks over the current object of his desire. Probably would have been good to say something when she called him out on it. 

It went something like this:

“Excuse me?!” she must wait a solid thirty seconds for him to start speaking before she follows up with, “Idiot.” and walks away. 

“Er, sorry?” he replies in _nowhere_ near a squeak. But she spins back around and he can’t help but drop his gaze to where her now soaking top is clinging to her waist. He’s feeling light-headed.

“Question or a statement?” she crosses her arms like she knows he’s checking her out, raising an eyebrow in a glare. God, she’s beautiful. He’s taken aback by the harshness of her words though and adds rude to the list of qualities he’s started writing about her.

“It was just an accident.” He manages to blurt out, which he’s pretty happy with because all of the thoughts in his head are pinned on the drip of alcohol running down her neck. He follows it till it dips below her neckline and shit, he’s definitely staring. May would be mad.

“Accident or not, you can still legitimately apologise without checking me out. Asshole.” He chokes on nothing while trying to figure out how he fucked it up so bad.

**Michelle**

She clocks that the drink spiller is here the second she walks into the party. His arms draw her attention in the moment he’s in her peripheral vision. Honestly, it’s rude. So she sets about ignoring him and finding someone else to occupy her thoughts. 

Leaning against the wall and nursing a beer, she’s looking around the room to see if there’s anyone she wants even half of the amount that she seems to want him. Her gaze flickers back over to where he was - if she ends up going home unsatisfied she’ll have to finish herself off and she’ll need some inspiration. 

Unluckily for her, he seems to be heading in her direction. Although he is wearing a black long-sleeved tee which should be illegal, so not that unlucky. He also looks a little flustered, like he’s nervous. She decides she’s not mad about it. 

“Sorry.” he blurts out when he’s about 2 feet from here, she can smell his cologne and something settles deep within her. She cocks her left eyebrow, sorry for what? Dumbass. He looks down and fiddles with his beer bottle and she sees a head of curly brown hair which she is suddenly very interested in figuring out how well it pulls. Does he like having it pulled? He scoffs and says,

“Are you always this rude to people trying to apologise to you?”

She’s taken aback because really he only said one word and didn’t even elaborate. What if she doesn’t recognise him? She could go that route, play ignorance, but really she’s mad he thinks one syllable is enough to properly express if you’re sorry.

“Rude, because what? I haven’t fawned over the fact you’ve dared to apologise for spilling an entire round of drinks down me? When I waited, literally soaking in front of you and you said nothing?”

He blushes and, fuck, that’s hot. She didn’t mean to say anything dirty, but she might try and include it now he has that reaction. Fuck with him a little bit. Maybe just fuck him.

“Well, I was just distracted. I meant to apologise!” he says flailing his arms around. She thinks about how they’d feel wrapped around her, she wants to give in and start outright flirting but she remembers who she is.

“Oh okay, that’s alright then,” she says with enough snark that he figures she’s not serious. 

“Just because you’re beautiful doesn’t mean you can be rude.” he widens his eyes like he regrets letting that information out. Interesting. She bites her lip to try and hide her smile at his outburst, she isn’t interested in boosting his ego. But his eyes follow the movements of her mouth and she thinks, maybe a boost will help.

She decides to see how far she can push it, so she releases her lip and then slowly runs her tongue along the top one. The corners of her mouth edge up without her permission as his eyes widen and he groans. 

He moves closer to her, raising his hand to lean against the wall next to the head, she has a very nice view of his bicep from here. 

“Are you trying to kill me?”

“Yeah, is it working?” she says knowing full well it is, his gaze hasn’t left her lips. Suddenly his eyes flit up to hers and her presses ever closer till their bodies are touching. Lips grazing hers as he says, 

“Fuck, yes.” Slipping his tongue into her mouth the first time their lips touch. She returns the kiss and goes to raise her hands to his hair when she remembers where they are. So she pulls back and watches in amusement as he follows her with furrowed eyebrows. God, he’s so fucking cute.

“Let’s go.” She says tugging his hand and placing her bottle on the side table just in front of the door, he follows suit, immediately placing the now empty hand on her lower back. 

**Peter**

He cannot believe his luck. Yes, she’s rude and he genuinely only wanted to apologise, but how is he meant to say ‘I got so distracted by how attractive I think you are, I forgot how to speak’. Honestly, she should know the effect she has. Surely no one knows how to form a sentence around her when she looks at them. 

Turns out he doesn’t need to form sentences around her, not if she sits on his face. Michelle, however, is an avid talker and he is all for it. 

“Fuck, Peter.” She says as he helps guide her hips along his face. He’s only been acquainted with her clit for about 10 minutes and he’s already sure he’d be happy to stay here forever. Already trying to think of a way to make this happen again. 

“I need- shit, can you-” she breaks mid-sentence as he slowly enters a finger in, a whine leaving her throat as he pulls it back out that he’s going to replay over and over again. Without letting up his hold on her thigh, leaving his finger in her but not moving it and tilting his head to the side so she can hear him he asks, “what do you want?” he kisses her thigh, “Tell me, you can have anything.” She’s breathless above him but he misses the way she pulls his hair already, so he slowly starts moving his finger out, adding a second one and smiling against her leg when she makes the sexiest noise he’s ever heard.

He’s so painfully hard, but he wants her, needs her to be satisfied. Telling himself it’s because she’ll be insufferable if she doesn’t. Even though the chance of the favour being returned is so low due to his superhuman abilities, which at the moment, he despises. 

“It’s okay-” she says between breaths, hips bucking against his mouth to get him where she wants him “-I can do it.” He sees what she means moments later when she releases her hold on his hair and snakes both her hands up her top and plays with her nipples. Maybe he won’t have a stimulation problem with her, he’s about ready to come in this pants anyway and she’s not even touched him. 

He groans as he watches her and she rocks against him again, “Peter, come on,” she chokes out and _“Fuck,_ Michelle,” he says as he licks at her clit and deepens his fingers. 

“Yes, yes, I’m so close-” and God he wants to see her come, so he curls his fingers and moments later she clenches her thighs and bucks against him. It’s a sight he doesn’t think will ever leave his mind. Groaning into her he slowly licks her through her come down until she lifts one of her knees over his head and flops beside him on the bed. 

“Fuck.”

“Thanks.” He replies, cocky because she can barely breathe and he did that. 

“Shut up.” She says shoving him with her foot but he’s pretty sure she’s laughing. She turns her head to face him, and Jesus how did he forget how beautiful she was. It takes him far too long to remember he doesn’t like her, he can’t remember why now, not when she’s flushed and half-naked anyway. Watching her lazily remove her hands from her boobs might set him over the edge.

“I helped you out anyway. It was teamwork.”

He barks out a laugh and says “Oh, teamwork was it? Is the next part gonna be teamwork too?” he watches her roll her eyes and it should be illegal. He’s so insanely attracted to her.

“Do you _want_ it to be teamwork?” She says flipping round to lay on her front, with her head propped up by one hand. 

He weighs up whether he should say yes or no, knowing that he’ll need extra stimulation to _finish,_ knowing he can’t fake it if they’re not having sex. But she was so smug earlier, so maybe he just… won’t tell her. Although that seems to mean. He doesn’t want to embarrass her. Calling her out for being rude or snarky is one thing, but there’s a trust you put in a person when you’re like this with them - something he doesn’t want to break. 

“Not to be rude, but it’s not very often someone else can get me to come. It’s just a thing. It has nothing to do with you, honestly. You’re like-” clearing his throat because he’s way too nervous. This is often a dealbreaker. “-insane. It’s just an issue, with… me. Erm, so you can start, if you want and I can help you out.” She looks perplexed like she wants to call him out on it but also doesn’t want to shame him if it’s true. 

“Extra, how?” She says sitting up and crosses her legged in front of him, it’s adorable. “Like you need more pressure? Or you need one of your senses heightened or something?” She can’t know how badly his senses fuck him up, how he can hear her heart beating, how he can see the light sheen of sweat on her collarbone. He has the intense urge to lick it off.

“All of the above?” he chuckles nervously. He’s only ever told girlfriends about this before, and usually, it ends with them being upset because it’s them. When it’s not, it’s him. He knows this, he just can’t explain it to people without telling them everything. He’d tell Michelle if she asked. 

“Okay, what are your preferences? Because I can start, if you like, and then you can tap in.”

Jesus Christ. He’s blushing, he knows he is. 

“Or I can just guess, I like a challenge,” she smirks when he nods his head like a bobblehead. She moves to lean over him, slowly undoing the button on his jeans - the heels of her hands brushing his dick slightly and he has to bite back a moan. 

He should feel weird about being completely naked around her but she feels safe. He’s brought out of his thoughts when she flicks the main light off and turns the bedside lamp on, he was so caught up in how safe he felt around her, he didn’t even notice her get up. So much for Spidey senses. With the main light off, it’s already so much better. He can see her without being overwhelmed and he can’t understand how well she knows what he needs. He doesn’t know her, never thought he’d get the chance to. 

She tells him to move to sit up on her bed with his back against the wall, it’s bizarre but the determination in her voice is one of the hottest things he’s ever experienced. “Ready?” he gulps but signifies that he is. She winks at him and he thinks he’s already dead. She walks over to the wall he’s opposite and he realises it’s her wardrobe and it slides. She slides it open and when she moves back he can see it’s a floor to ceiling mirror and he can see himself perfectly. 

When she turns back to him she has such an intense look in her eyes that he’s pretty sure he’d do anything that she asked. She lifts her top over her head and he wheezes, which he would find embarrassing if he could think of anything other than how much he wants her. How badly he wants to be able to have a normal sexual encounter, so the chances of her ever wanting to do it again are higher. 

She climbs onto the bed on all fours and _come on._ She knows how to work what she has, and she has absolutely everything. He’s staring but he’s like ninety-nine percent sure he should be. She moves so she’s straddling him, arms resting on his shoulders.

“Is this okay?”

“Yes, fuck - yes.”

She looks him dead in the eyes, leans in till her chest is touching his, lips brushing and says, “Good. Hands behind your back.” He groans as she teases her tongue into his mouth but ultimately does what she says. He’ll do whatever she wants. He’s not even sure of how he could ever say no.

She starts slowly moving herself along his dick, from the base to the tip, but never letting him _in_ her, and he can barely breathe. It’s not enough and it’s too much all at once. She’s still slick from her orgasm and he can feel her lips coating him, up and down and up and down. He might end up breaking his own fingers trying to restrain from touching her, from moving her faster or harder. 

“Tell me if you need to stop okay?” She says while nipping at the pulse point on his neck. 

He gets out some form of ‘hnnng’. He’s deliriously turned on and he’s never felt this before. It’s never gone this far before. She repositions so she’s in between his legs as she kisses down his chest, now she’s out of his line of sight he can see the mirror and honestly what the fuck is she doing to him. She’s made her way down to his navel, leaning on her forearms, knees bent and back arch and he can see _everything._

“Michelle, Jesus Christ.”

She shuffles back slightly, grabs the base of his dick and gives him an experimental pump and he’s thrusting into her hand like a neanderthal. 

“Fuck, sorry.” 

“Don’t be.” She replies, flips her hair over one shoulder in what might be the hottest movement in history and licks over the head of his cock, one hand at the base, one hand on the bed next to his hip. 

“Oh my _God_.” He’s not entirely sure he’s going to make it out alive. She hums as she takes him fully into her mouth and every single one of his senses is focused on her, her, her. The pressure of her tongue as she swirls going down, on the hollowness of her cheeks when she sucks back up, on the way he can see her glistening in the mirror. He’s not sure how much more he can take. Knowing this is the best it’s ever felt, but not knowing if it’ll be enough. He wants to touch her, needs to touch her. 

“Michelle, I - fuck-” he’s cut off when she lets go of him with a pop. He knows he looks utterly ruined, he can see it in the mirror, but then she’s in front of him asking for his hand, he gives it willingly. He’s too distracted by the wetness of her mouth and her swollen lips to realise she’s placed his hand on her shoulder, like a shelf, to hold her up. 

She moves up his body and his hand remains where she placed it, she whispers in his ear that she likes it when her hair is pulled. She moves it back to flow down the vast expanse of her back, gives him one last deeply filthy kiss and mummers against his lips, “Don’t drop me.”

With a wink, she moves back down and spreads her legs a little further and he has an unobstructed view of where his face was buried earlier, where he would very much like to be again. He feels one hand on his cock again but can’t take his eyes off of the mirror. 

He lets out a guttural moan when he watches her hand snake between her legs and two fingers slip straight into her cunt. She moans at the contact and simultaneously sinks back onto him, he can feel the vibrations and hey, tonight might be the night. 

“Fuck, look at you. Fucking yourself right in front of me, do you like it?” She hums in response and he realises this is what he needs. It’s all he needs. It’s her, it’s all her. 

“M, fuck - I’m so, I’m so close please.” She lets him go, looks up at him and she must see how ruined he looks because she bites her lip to suppress a smile. He wishes she’d let him see it. She lifts herself up using his hand, she slips her fingers out of herself and sucks them clean. Someone created her just for him and he’s not sure who but he’s never been more thankful. 

“What do you need? Tell me and you can have it.” And _fuck_. His hands fly to the back of her neck to drag her into a kiss. 

“You.” He pulls her up so she’s straddling him again and guides her along him again, faster with more purpose. He’s overwhelmed with how amazing it feels, how insane she looks. She’s panting into his mouth and apparently, he’s chatty when he’s this turned on. 

“Jesus Michelle, do you have any idea how sexy you are? You know right? You have to know. You’re driving me insane.”

“Peter.” She says and it’s accompanied by a low whine from the back of her throat and it’s his new favourite sound. 

Pulling her into a kiss that barely makes contact but is still one of the best things to ever happen to him, Spiderman be damned, he can feel himself about to lose control. His grip on her hips is proving difficult to focus on. He’d never want to hurt her, so he goes to move them up her ribs but she stops him, 

“Need you-” she kisses him, “I need you, can’t do it by myself.” He’s fully aware suddenly that this is the first time in this encounter where she seems more out of control than he is and he’s planning on using that to his advantage. 

“Oh yeah?” Okay so he sounds a little breathless, have you seen her? “Say please,” he says resting his hands against her hips but offering no leverage. 

“Fuck-” she says as he brings one hand round to her nipple and tweaks while the other swipes down at her clit and then she’s coming “-fuck, fuck, fuck.”

Shit. He’s lost the upper hand but _Jesus Christ._ He can’t find the strength to care, not when she looks like that, still slowly rubbing herself against him and he _needs_ her.

“Michelle.” He says flexing his hands over her hips. She leans down to kiss him slowly, her tongue teasing his until his eyes roll back. 

“Say please.” She says against his mouth, opening his eyes he can see the gleam in her eyes. She’s the hottest person he’s ever seen, and she’s naked and sweaty and on top of him. But he’s Spider-man. He doesn’t beg. 

She bites his earlobe and, “please, Michelle, fuck - please.” Okay, so he tried. She rewards him by increasing her pace and whispering dirty things into his ear and he can’t remember ever feeling like this. He comes hard and fast as she finishes telling him how she’d imagined this ever since she first saw him. How she wanted him to fuck her against the wall the second she saw him at the party. 

“Jesus Christ, that was-.”

“Teamwork,” she replies with a wink as she leans in to kiss him.

**Michelle**

She doesn’t feel bad for kicking him out. It’s not cold out and he’s got arms the size of tree trunks so he’ll be fine. She doesn’t let hookups stay over, and that’s what he is. A rude, violently attractive hookup. She did feel a bit bad when he hit her with the ridiculous puppy dog eyes, so she gave him her number. She’s not expecting him to call. 

He does text though. She can’t imagine he’s any further than one block away by the time she receives it, and she hides her face in her pillow. 

Peter Parker: Hey, this is Peter. 

MJ: Peter?

Peter Parker: Yeah, erm, from earlier.

Peter Parker: Oh fuck you. 

MJ: You’d love that. 

Peter Parker: I would.

MJ: Let’s do that?

Peter Parker: What, now? I can come back.

MJ: No, not now, dork. 

MJ: But maybe we could. If one of us ever fancied it. Think about it. 

Peter Parker: Like friends with benefits?

Peter Parker: Because yes.

Peter Parker: Please. 

MJ: Cool. 

Peter Parker: I’m free tomorrow :) 

She leaves him on read. Mainly because emoji use -but also because she didn’t exactly mean friends with benefits. She meant they could go out, and then inevitably end up having sex. But if he just wants sex then that’s fine too. She’s not really in the right place for anything serious anyway. Friends with benefits will be fine fine. She’s not planning on falling in love with him anyway. 

If she falls asleep surrounded by the smell of him on her sheets and the thought of him in her mind, that’s nobody’s business but her own.

**Peter**

They’ve been casually fucking for a couple of weeks now and he’s pretty happy with how chill he is being about it. He’s yet to ask her on a date, he’s yet to do anything above and beyond what a decent human being would do. Take that, Ned. 

They’ve been keeping a relaxed schedule, usually texting in the late evening to see if they wanna have sex, he always says yes -but he can’t be blamed for that. Last time she gave him a blowjob in the shower, how is he supposed to be rational when he thinks about her, knowing what she looks like on her knees. 

Sure he thinks about her during the day too - wonders what she’s up too, how her day is going. He often finds himself going to text her just because he misses the way she calls him out on his emoji use. Or he wants to see how her meeting, that she mentioned in passing while pulling his jumper off, went. 

And maybe sometimes he’s in the grocery store and thinks about how he could make her breakfast if she ever stayed over at his place and didn’t get an uber at three in the morning. He’s too nervous to ask her to stay, scared she’ll say no. Truthfully he knows if she said no it wouldn’t be the end of the world, they’re only friends who fuck. Acquaintances who fuck - but the thought of her not wanting to stay with him, the way he wants to stay with her, makes him be silent when she brings the app up. 

He wants to see what she looks like when she’s just woken up when she’s at her softest, he assumes. He wants to know if she’s a cuddler during the night, he has a feeling that she is - that sometimes he can feel her turning towards him after sex, sometimes lingering near his chest for a beat longer than necessary. He’s too scared to wrap his arms around her though, what if she doesn’t want that? 

He’s brought out of his musing by a text… from Michelle. It’s only mid-afternoon and his anxiety is flaring because what if she’s in danger and she needs Spider-Man? Okay, yeah the likelihood is not high considering he hasn’t told her yet - not that he’s going to later or anything. 

MJ: Saw this and thought of you. 

His heart grows at the sight of a dog dressed in a Star Wars costume. His heart grows again when he realises she’s _thinking_ about him. 

Pete: dfaidfeyfae look at them! What do you think they’re called?

Pete: Chewbarky? It’s that isn’t it?

MJ: The way I snorted in the street. I hate you.

He’s smiling so hard at his phone that he’s surprised he hasn’t been called out on it. There’s no one in his apartment with him but still, can’t the people on the floor below hear how happy he is? 

Pete: When are you done with class?

MJ: Just heading home now. The afternoon slot was cancelled, so.

He could ask her to come over now right? He doesn’t even want to have sex with her right now, he just - misses her. 

Pete: Do you want to come over?

Pete: Like now? 

Pete: Instead of going home?

Okay so spamming her phone is probably not the best move but he’s done it now and despite the fact he can make synthetic webs he still hasn’t figured out how to not be a colossal dumbass. 

MJ: Sure :)

Pete: AN EMOJI?

Pete: Michelle. Blink twice if you need help.

MJ: Shut up, dork. I’ve had a long day and it’s only 3:30. 

When she gets to his place twenty minutes later he’s got a tea at drinking temperature, which he thinks is a bit much but her face lights up and she holds the mug with both hands and he can’t believe he was this stupid.

She asks to borrow one of his jumpers because it’s chilly after she took her jacket off and he takes a solid minute to answer because he’s thinking about how much he adores her in daytime clothes. Knowing what she looks like underneath turns him on a distracting amount, but he’s content to sit here and watch her flail her arms around in his hoodie that’s too big for her, as she describes why she had a bad day, and he can’t believe he missed the signs. 

It takes him three times to convince her to borrow some sweatpants because no one likes to lounge around in jeans, and he cannot cope with how adorable she looks in his clothes - ankles surely getting cold. But he catches her smelling the jumper and smiling and he can’t believe he was so blind. As if he was never going to fall for her. 

**Michelle**

Being with Peter makes her happier than she thought it would. Sure, she thought they might date instead of just being friends with benefits at the beginning, but she got over that. Besides, she knows he doesn’t like her like that, so there’s no point thinking about it. 

It’s difficult not to think about it though when he has tea at the perfect temperature for her when she knows the last time she was over there weren’t any supplies. How he grabbed her around her waist to push her into his bedroom to pick some sweats. How they smelt like him. 

If she’s honest, she doesn’t really feel like having sex today - sure he could probably go down on her and she’d enjoy it, but she’s all about saying no when yes isn’t the first thing you think of. He hasn’t asked though, hasn’t even mentioned it - so she’s confused as to why he invited her over. Ignoring the fact that she said yes with an ulterior motive - she missed him. 

They’re lounging on the couch, and he’s asked her more personal questions in the last hour than he has any other time. And the only thing she doesn’t like about it is how easy it is to talk to him. How much she wants to tell him about her family, and the way she knows some of her coping mechanisms are fucked up. How she hopes they never get put onto him. She’s only ever told her best friend Harry about her childhood, and the various scenarios that made her the way she is. But she wants to tell Peter, she just never knows how. 

“Why do you need a new mug every time you get a new job or start something new?” He asks, relaxed against the arm of the sofa, fully facing her. If she stretched her legs she could touch him with her toes, she misses touching him. 

She was so in her head she didn’t even realise she told him that. She’s never told anyone the reason - avoids talking about her Dad like the plague. 

“Er- just, like them I guess.” She says playing with the cuffs of Peter’s sweatshirt that she’s definitely going to steal if he lets her. 

“Cause your Dad likes them?” He asks, slightly probing, like he desperately wants to know the answer but to be there for her, as opposed to wanting something from her in return. Looking up at him, she realises there’s a burning sensation at the back of her eyes and she wants to run and hide. 

“Hey-” he says sitting up “-I’m sorry, you don’t have to tell me. Tell me about the job you wanna go for instead.” He carries on softly. “I wanna know, please.” And he says it with such an exaggerated pout that she can’t help but laugh, but she can hear the sadness lingering in the back of her throat, and judging by the look in his eyes so can he. 

“Wait, I’m freezing, are you cold?” He says rubbing his arms frantically as if he’s not been fine in a T-Shirt every time she’s ever seen him, she rolls her eyes at him. “Come here, please. Warm me up you stole all my clothes.” He says with his arms open for her. 

She bites her lip in an attempt to hide her smile, though she’s noticed more of them slipping through. She moves over to him, laying on his chest between his legs and his arms immediately wrap around her.

“You forced me into these, nerd.” Trying to be scathing but she’s running her hand up and down his side anyway. Revelling in the way his entire body tenses when she gets close to his hip. For his part he’s running his hands through her hair, as best he can she guesses, it’s a minefield - but occasionally he runs his nails across her scalp and she feels calm, peaceful, at home. 

“My Dad used to buy me a mug for my birthday and Christmas every year-” she’s just tracing a scar near his elbow to help calm her down, although he helps. “-and every year it would be a little more extravagant you know?” He squeezes her waist and she feels him kiss the top of her head and she’s petrified about the fact she’s falling for him.

“So, then we had competitions to see who could get the better mug, it’s stupid-”

“That’s not stupid, Em.” She looks up at him and he’s already looking at her. She settles back on his chest, she’s comfortable enough to tell him this but she can’t do it while looking at him. And she wants to tell him. 

“Anyway, it was fun you know. And then Mum got sick and Dad got… well, he did the best he could with what he had. And it turns out he didn’t have very much without her. But he still tried… it’s just - he could only really save himself.” She says the last part around a lump in her throat, the same one that appears anytime she tries to think about how much he loves her, and how hard she knows he tried. But how ultimately it wasn't enough. 

“So -” she feels Peter’s arms tighten around her like he’s trying to hold her together. “-So the mugs stopped coming, but I still gave him one every year. Or I did. But then one time he moved and I don’t know where-” the tears are free-falling now, and she can see them dampening his top, but she just holds on tighter.

“It’s been a few years but I miss him-” she feels his hand snake up the back of her neck and buries into her hair, he keeps whispering that it’s okay and she’s never felt so safe “-so I just buy them for myself but for big occasions, you know. Not like my birthday or anything, that would be lame.” She says complete with a sniff. 

“Nothing you could ever do would be lame, Michelle.”

“Shut up, loser.” She responds looking up at him again, no longer scared. 

“You’re beautiful-” he says with a kiss to her nose, “-and insanely smart-” a kiss to her forehead, “-you’re brave-” his hand travels to her chin to tilt her face towards him and he rubs his nose along hers - “anyone would be lucky to have you,” he says against her lips. 

She repositions so she can slowly deepen the kiss and feels the vibrations of his moan deep in her throat. While she feels better than before, she’s still not feeling one hundred percent, and for the first time she’s nervous to bring it up. She shouldn’t be. Knowing full well Peter would never pressure her into anything, and she’s more than okay to leave if he’s an ass. But she doesn’t want the awkward conversation. Luckily for her, Peter seems to know exactly how she’s feeling at all times. 

Slowing the kiss down, he peppers light pecks all over her face and she giggles and can’t find it in herself to be mad about it. She’s sad again for a second when she glances outside and she’s that it’s dark, which means she needs to go home soon. She sits up ready to make a move. 

“Wanna get pizza?”

“What’s the time? I should probably get going soon.” She looks down and misses the way his face falls.

“Oh sure, erm, it’s eight. We could eat first if you want?”

“Sure.” He sits up and pulls her into another hug, humming happily into her hair. 

“Can you-”

“Half spinach and black olives, I know.” He says with a kiss to her forehead. And her heart beats a little too fast, and she’s definitely blushing. He gets up to grab his phone but stops to pull a blanket from the back of the chair and drapes it around her like a wizard. She looks up at him in confusion, unaware he has his camera out until the flash goes off. 

“God, you’re cute-” she watches him stare at his phone with a smile on his face, clearing his throat as she raises her eyebrow at him “You’re on drinks!”

“But I’m so cosy now - I’m never leaving this nest.” She says pulling the blanket tightly around her. 

“A nest? You’re in a nest?” He says with his eyes wide with adoration. He surges forwards to kiss her and she has just enough time to get her hands free to grip his collar. 

“Stay please, stay with me tonight.” He says between kisses.

“Yeah, okay.” She says breathlessly at the way he looks at her. Hoping that she’s not reading this wrong. 

**Peter**

It doesn’t count as a date when she specifically asked him to go as her fake date. Although his heart borderline gave out when she asked him and he still can’t fight the fluttery feeling in his stomach when he gets ready for the night. She specifically said fake date. He needs to keep remind himself because he falls for her more with everything that she does. 

The second he spots her at the bar he wants to take her home. Knowing that was the end goal didn’t make the evening any easier. She’d asked him to be her date, _fake_ date, for an event he can’t remember because she looks like she does. Attempting to hide an erection for over three hours turns out to be _hard_. And she sort of already makes him come once in the bathroom. 

He should have known she was going to look insane, she always does. But he was willfully unprepared to see her like this. He notices as soon as she walks in the room, he can’t even see her. He just knows she’s there. In the amount of time, they’ve been sleeping together all of his senses have tuned themselves to her. Her heart rate, her smell. He always appears to be missing something when she’s not around. He can’t bring himself to figure out what that might be. 

Laying her down on his bed he tells her all this, as she pulls him closer laughing into a kiss. 

“I love fucking with you,” she says a little tipsy, her eyes shining as she plays with the hair at the back of his neck. 

He’s got the overwhelming urge to tell her he loves her, but he shakes that thought back because what? 

“I love fucking you,” he says instead, hiding the truth somewhere else, somewhere he won’t look for a while. 

“Do it then, I only wore this so you could take it off.” He pulls her dress off with one tug, eyes widening as he takes her in. 

“Michelle. Tell me you haven’t been-” he moves to lay on top off her, holding his weight with his knees and forearms “- naked underneath that fucking dress all night.” 

Her hands lightly trace the button on his shirt, slowly opening one before she answers and moves onto the next.

“Oh-” she licks a kiss into his mouth and he groans against her smile “-and you’re telling me you wore this shirt by accident?” 

“Maybe-” leaning on one arm he uses his free hand to hold both of her wrists and bring them above her head, she lets him “-maybe I love fucking with you too.”

“Keep your hands here for me, kay?” he says, kissing down her neck, grinding himself against her when she whispers, a “Yes, Sir.” 

“Michelle. Careful.” He let’s go of her wrists and chances a glance up at her while he makes his way down her body, licking and kissing every inch of her that he wanted to touch the second he saw her this evening. She’s breathtaking. He thinks she’s perfect in anything, but completely naked is his favourite. Or maybe his favourite is her in his clothing. But naked is a close second. 

She arches into his touch when he ghosts his tongue over her nipple, grazing it with his teeth in the way he knows is going to make her moan.

“Pete, don’t even-” she sucks in a breath when he grazes his fingers over the other once, lightly squeezing her breast. He’s in the mood to make her beg, she’s been messing with him all evening.

“I already made you come, don’t be an asshole.” She says bucking her hips into his but he’s quicker than her - knows how she ticks, so he lifts himself off and watches her bite her lip at the lack of contact where she needs it. 

“Did you, Michelle?” He replies, moving further south. He has a theory that he could make her come touching her nipples only but he gets too turned on at the noises she makes to test it for longer than a few minutes. He’s already rutting against the mattress to get some of the ache in his dick to go away.

“Or did you blow me, looking like _that_ I might add-” he places a kiss to her inner thigh, revealing in the fact that she’s so wet he can see it glistening here “- and then tell me to finish myself off while you watched huh?”

She hums out a breathy laugh because she knows what she was doing, she knew it would lead to this. He’s happy to follow her anywhere. He licks a straight line up her centre, so light he’s surprised she felt it. 

“Fuck, Peter.” She says gripping the pillow above her. He’s playing a game with himself to try and determine how far he can push her before she’s moving her hands into his hair. He thinks it’s three fingers, but tonight it might be two. 

He starts with one, ghosting around her cunt until she moves her hips slightly to try and get him inside. So he pulls back to a whine from Michelle. He slowly pushes it all the way in, crooking it slightly and is content with the way her hips buck up to meet him. He smiles against her thigh as she sighs. 

“Stop being smug.”

“How did you know!” He says moving his finger in and out slowly, placing the tip of his tongue against her clit but not moving. 

“I-” he watches her go-to move her hands to his hair and he’s excited, but she stops halfway and plucks at her nipples which he decides is much better “-I know you, dork.”

The want to tell her he loves her again pops up and he finds it harder to shove it down, especially when she says his name like it was made for her. Like she owns him. He wants to be hers. 

He channels these feelings into swirling his tongue around her clit in the way he knows she likes because he knows her too. When he pulls his finger out so he can a second, she whines at the lack of contact and it makes him put extra pressure where he thinks she needs him. 

“Too much.” He backs off, slightly shy because he messed up and she’s never done anything he doesn’t love. He focuses back on fucking her with his fingers, mesmerised by how wet his fingers are when they aren’t buried deep in her. 

“It’s okay.” One of her hands stops playing with her nipple to come and rest lightly at the side of his face. He kisses her palm. 

“Pete.” He looks up at her and fuck is there ever a time where he’s not hit with how gorgeous she is. She looks wrecked and it hits his dick so hard he grinds into the mattress again. She smiles at him, biting her bottom lip and he kisses her thigh again, smiling against her. 

“Dork.” He hears her say fondly. He latches his lips around her clit and sucks until she falls back, and both hands are buried in his hair, holding him in place. He could move, he knows that she probably knows that. But he won’t -he’ll do whatever she wants. 

“Yes, right there - _fuck.”_ He knows he shouldn’t be embarrassed by getting something wrong, knowing that he corrected it as soon as she said and that it’s hot as fuck when she tells him what to do. But the self criticism is something he’s dealt with forever and creeps into his sexual life occasionally. 

“Jesus - can you feel how wet you make me?” _Christ_.

“I love it when you fuck me with your fingers, I love it when you fuck me with your dick -” she gasps as he wraps his arm around her thigh to bring her closer, listening to the change in her heartbeat “-I love -”. She comes around his fingers and against his tongue with a silent scream, back arched off the bed. 

He licks her through her comedown and then crawls up the bed to kiss her, he’s missed her mouth. 

“Hi.”

“Hey, baby.”

“Oh so you can call me baby, but if I do I get kicked?” She rolls her eyes in response and it’s unreasonable how turned on she gets him. 

“Tell me you don’t like it.” 

“I hate you.” He responds as she moves to undo the buttons that were left forgotten earlier in his need to see her come undone around him. 

“Ooh, will you fuck me like you hate me?” She says and he knows she must know the effect she has on him. Sitting upon his knees, he wraps an arm around her back and pulls her up against him. 

“If I did that -” he can’t resist a kiss to her neck, she leans back to accommodate “- you’d have to beg for it.”

She wraps her arms around his neck, staring at him in a way that makes his stomach flip. 

“You said that last time.” She says pulling his bottom lip with her teeth, making him groan against her. And she’s right, he did. But he’s so intoxicated by her that he’ll give her whatever she wants. Rubbing his hands up and down the long expanse of her back, he thinks about how lucky he is to see her like this.

“Do you _want_ me to beg for it?” 

“Yes, Jesus Christ. You drive me crazy, Michelle.” She pushes his chest so he flips them so he’s lying down and she’s straddling him. She finishes undoing his buttons, moving this shirt apart to lick from his navel to the dip in his throat. He’s gripping her hips too tight, he can tell she’s going to have bruises tomorrow so he tries to relax, he never wants to hurt her. 

“You can grip me tighter, baby, I can take it.” He flips them over so he’s now hovering over her again and kisses her deeply, swallowing her moans. As she slips her tongue into his mouth he goes to unbutton his trousers, taking them and his boxers off in near-record time. Lifting himself off her he’s thrusting into nothing looking for friction at the sight of her licking her lips at him while attempting to take his shirt off. Fucking cufflinks, he rips them off, and the cuffs, oops, and throws it to the floor. He’s back on her moments later, grinding against her cunt and the slick from her orgasm. 

“Michelle.” He all but whines. They know how this goes now, he’s successfully come every single time he’s been with her, but he still needs the extra stimulation. 

“Tell me.” He’s nervous to ask her for too much, even knowing that if she didn’t want to she’d say. He never wants to pressure her into anything. He’s had long term relationships before, but never casual sex. Especially casual sex with someone he likes so much. So he’s not sure of the etiquette. 

“You can have it. If you ask me, I’ll give it to you.” He lowers his head onto her chest, trying to steady his breathing, feeling safe when she wraps her arms around him. She usually takes the lead with this stuff - the more confident of the two. But he knows that’s not fair, that he should be more open with what he likes. 

“I like it when you tell me what to do.” Oh. 

“Yeah?” He says, pulling back to look at her. He misses looking at her. She smiles shyly like she knows he’s so gone for her. He feels like they’re teetering on the edge of something when they’re together like this but they’re both too scared to say what it is. And then the second they’re fully clothed or it’s daytime, they both run. But he’s here now, with her, in her arms. 

“Yeah-” she says a little shyly, he loves it when she’s soft “-I trust you. I like doing this with you. I like it when it’s fun for both of us.”

“It’s always fun for me, Em.” He rubs his nose along hers and lets her pull him into a soft kiss that becomes filthy the moment her tongue touches his. 

“I like -” her hands are buried in his hair and he can’t bring himself away from her lips long enough to get his sentence out “-I like it when you tell me-” she bucks her hips into his and he groans against her “-how much you want me.”

She hums against his neck and he’s embarrassed for a second that she might not want to do that. That she might think it’s awkward, or cringey. He waxes lyrical about how much he wants her, but then she can’t be surprised about that fact - he did spill four drinks over her the first time he saw her because he couldn't get over how good she looked. 

She licks her way up his throat and whispers in his ear, “You like it when I tell you how I’ve been thinking about you all day?” he groans in response, grinding himself against her. 

“How I spent my entire meeting the other day imagining you bending me over the desk-”

“Michelle.” He says for no other reason than to say her name and remind himself this isn’t a dream. 

“I want you all the time-” she pulls his face to hers, kissing him softly in a way that makes him tense his entire body but simultaneously feels lighter than air “-everywhere, anywhere. I want you.”

“Me too-” shaking his head to her amusement he tries again “-I want you all the time.” She could call him out on it, he knows this. He’s not sly about the fact he’d do anything for her. Sexually. Well and in any other way as well. But she doesn’t call him out, instead, she looks uncharacteristically shy, biting her lower lip in a way that drives him insane. 

“I want you to be inside me now, like right now.” She says running her hands up and down his back. He manages a noise of agreement and moves lower down the bed so he can line up with her. Looking back at her to check she’s still okay, he’s blown away with the amount of feeling he has for her. 

Leaning forward to kiss her again, just because, his dick grinds against her clit again and she gasps into his mouth instead of returning the kiss and he smiles dopily at her. 

“Pete- come on.” She says in his favourite tone, laced with desire for him, and obviously, he has to give her what she wants. He’s not sure he’s capable of turning her down. Can’t see how he’d ever want to. 

“Wait - condom, please.” Shit. He’s glad one of them in this relationship is sensible. He has the condom out and wrapped around him in record time - lightly slapping her hand away when she goes to put it on him. Yeah, he still needs extra stimulation but he wants to make this good for her and she already said she thinks about him bending her over an office table so he’s pretty close. 

Slowly easing himself into her, puffing air against her shoulder as he battles against himself to thrust. Realistically he can feel that she’s wet enough for him to go faster, harder - but she doesn’t know about Spiderman yet and he’s petrified to hurt her. They’ve only known each other a few weeks so he hasn’t given much thought as to whether or not he should tell her. He knows she only wants to be casual, even though when it’s nighttime she becomes softer, more like she _likes_ him. 

“ _Move_ , please.” She says into his neck when he doesn’t realise he’s bottomed out in her, spending too long distracted by what she means to him, to his life, to Spider-Man. Deciding to shelve that thought for another time he slowly pulls back out, taking great pleasure in hearing her gasp, waiting for her breathing to settle before thrusting faster. 

He loves getting lost in the feel of her, wet and hot around him, adores hearing her say his name like it’s only meant me for him, treasures the way she always brings his face to hers to kiss him deeply just before she comes when they’re like this. 

He’d spend the rest of his life looking for someone to be this close with, to feel this at home with - he’s pretty sure he’s found her. He just needs to make sure he doesn’t mess it up in the time it takes him to get the courage to do something about it that isn’t just sleeping with her.

**Michelle**

It’s not the first time he’s been late to come and see her. Sometimes she gets a text and sometimes she doesn’t. Usually, she gets over it with an episode of Parcs and Rec and a tea. Sometimes she’ll make him work for it when he turns up. Tonight, she’s pissed. 

After a long day at work and a meeting that could have been an email, she’s in the mood to have sex. Lots of sex, maybe some edge play. What she’s not in the mood for is Peter running late with no sense of decorum and letting people know. 

So instead, she does it herself. She doesn’t need him. She’s been borderline mad at the way things have been going, how her feelings are becoming more intense. He just wants to be friends with benefits. She has to remind herself whenever he looks at her a little too long, and she already asked him out - so she’s not about to ask again. 

Sometimes she feels as though he likes her. Like _likes_ her. And she’s kinda bored of the whole playing games, so she thinks about bringing it up - asking him to his face. But then he pulls stunts like tonight and leaves her hanging for three hours with no heads up. 

So she throws her phone down, after checking uselessly one last time, puts on some of her favourite lingerie and grabs old faithful from the nightstand. She’s annoyed at herself temporarily for thinking it could be fun to use with Peter. 

Laying on her bed, legs spread lazily, she spends a solid ten seconds deciding whether or not to tease herself to a finish or to do a quick bang and get a solid night's sleep. She decides on the sleep, and maybe a pizza - so she shoots off a quick order for half spinach and olives and half double pepperoni. Annoyed at herself for ordering for her and Peter when he’s not here. She decides just because Peter’s not here, doesn’t mean he can’t help. Slowly running her hands over her body she thinks about all the things she’d let Peter do to her if he were here. How it would feel. What he’d say. 

She pulls at her nipples in the way he does and finds it works pretty well if she imagines it’s his touch, his tongue on her. Slipping a hand into her underwear she shivers at how wet she is just thinking about him, wishing it was his hand instead of hers - knowing that while she’s spent a good few years figuring out her own body, Peter is an eager learner. 

Fantasizing about the way his body holds her down, how he seems to be able to get her to come when she least expects it is what makes her finally turn the vibrator on. Moving her panties to the side she lightly trails it from her centre up to her clit and back. She bucks into the air when it reaches her clit again and she’s momentarily displeased that his weight isn’t on top of her.

Instead of revelling in all the ways, she misses him, she works with what she can remember. All the filthy things he’s gotten used to whispering in her ear, the way he groans whenever she makes a noise, how it clearly turns him on to get her off. The thought has her holding the vibrator on her clit for longer until she can feel the signs of an oncoming orgasm. 

Grabbing the pillow beside her head instead of his hair, and clenching her thighs around nothing but her hand she moans his name as she comes. She’s not mad about it, he helped out. While she’s baking in the afterglow, she’s trying to figure out why she’s still so down. And she’s so annoyed when she figures out it’s because she misses him, misses his laugh and his presence and how he makes her tea afterwards that she all but runs into the bathroom to pee and wash her vibrator.

There’s a knock at the door which startles her, so she throws the vibrator on the bed, grabs a twenty from the nightstand and picks up Peter’s sweatshirt to cover herself with. When she checks the peephole she sees Peter holding her pizza with what she thinks is the beginnings of a shiner. 

Throwing the sweatshirt and the cash on the sofa she flings the door open, inwardly ecstatic at the way he groans at her. 

“You can just go home.”

Peter attempts to defend himself despite having to know why she’s mad, “Michelle! Something came up okay, sorry, jeez. I’m only-” he checks his watch and his eyes widen “-erm, 2 hours late. I came all the way over!”

“Well I already came, so you’re not needed. Maybe next time.” 

He looks at her like he’s trying to decide if he’s mad she’s not letting him come in, or turned on because she’s in his favourite set of underwear. He sputters out a reply, “Michelle” he says, with a possible whine. “Come on,” d _efinitely_ begging. 

“Later, Parker.” She responds smugly and slams the door in his face. 

She feels bad and contemplates opening the door and telling him she’s joking - but then she thinks about all the times he clearly isn’t thinking about the way she’s waiting for him, doesn’t even think about her long enough to send a text. So she lets the door stay closed and grabs a slice of pizza to help take her mind off the fact that she really likes him, and he only likes to fuck her. It doesn’t work and she swallows one and a half slices around the lump in her throat. 

**Peter**

Peter is sitting on a counter seat, far enough away from the register that he didn't need to make small talk or awkwardly smile whenever he meets the baristas eye for the 18th time in 10 minutes. He’s trying to decide what to do about last night. Should he tell Michelle why he was late? Seeing as that has the opportunity to come up again.

But then he remembers how she kicked him out, never actually even letting him past the threshold. And she opened the door looking like that. He groans remembering how she looked. It annoys him how sexy he thinks she is. Knowing that he’d never be able to turn her down. His pride is a little hurt that she was able to. He was right there. He can’t see past the frustration and annoyance long enough to see that she has a point. He knows why she’s mad. 

He notices the air in the coffee shop switch from pleasant to overwhelmingly mediocre and then Brad’s at his side before he even has the chance to swallow down the ‘fuck sake’ that enters his mind anytime he sees him. Peter prides himself on being polite, May didn’t raise an assehole. But God, he can’t stand Brad. He’s been a dick since high school, will be a dick long into his probably non-greying years. He always thinks he can do whatever he wants. 

A cocky smile and a wink will get him out of all situations, and he’s right. Well, that and Daddy’s money. But he’s not rude enough to bring that up. Especially not after he did in Freshman year of High School and Brad replied that he was jealous because at least he had a Dad. 

“Pete! Long time no see, huh?” Brad sighs, looking him up and down like he’s worthless. 

“Brad, a pleasure.” 

“How’s life? Wife? House? Job?” he says chuckling. He’s only 23! Who has any of those things at 23?! He’s a child! He wants to call him out but he sees the way Brad straightens up like he always did at school when something is coming he wants to impress. Hearing him mutter a ‘fuck’ under his breath. He’s about to turn around to see what or who Brad is referring to when he feels an arm go round his waist. 

“Hey, baby.” Michelle says, leaning her head on his shoulder, “Who’s this?” 

Fuck. This is not what he needs right now. He must be an oozing pathetic mess. Yes, he’s glad Brad looks stupefied about the fact that she’s touching him, let alone that she might be his girlfriend. But she’s not, and it hurts in a way he can’t understand. That yeah, Brad will think she is, but it’s not the same.

He can’t hold her hand outside this conversation. Can’t ask her to dinner. He tries to think of all the reasons he never used to like her, she’s rude, well she was once and it was definitely his fault. And several other things he can’t think of when she’s this close and she’s this beautiful. 

“I’m Brad,” he replies, holding his hand out to shake it and being all pretentious and ew, he hates him. 

“Sup,” MJ replies, not really as a question, but Brad looks utterly enamoured with her. He wants to say he’s seen her naked, heard her moan his name. He wants Brad to know he knows what she sounds like when he's knuckle deep in her and she’s begging for him. He neglects to notice how she doesn’t offer him her hand, too distracted with the way she’s playing with the hair at the back of his neck. 

She turns his head with her hand and kisses him, soft and slow, like there isn’t someone in front of them. He’s half annoyed at how quickly he gets pulled into her space, especially since she mugged him off yesterday. But the other half is oh so glad someone who looks like her can kiss him like that. Pulling back she says, “hi, I missed you last night.” So he doesn’t hate her big deal. 

A cough brings him out of dopily staring at her. 

“Oh hey, man.” He says to Brad while dropping his arm around MJ and sliding his hand into her back pocket. “This is Michelle, she’s my girlfriend.” He says with more ease than he thought possible. Looking at her again, she looks back and has a small smile on her face, one that she usually doesn't let him see. It’s his favourite thing.

He’s annoyed at himself for thinking that she would like him like that. So she let him in a few times, and they’ve been hanging out more often without having sex. He always initiates holding hands, or casually hugging her. What if she’s doing it to be polite? Because he’s figured out what she likes in bed? He knows he’s being unfair, but his pride is hurt and he’s hurt so he acts like a moron.

He looks away from her quickly without moving his hand, what? She has a great ass. 

“Right, well. See you around, Michelle.” Rude. He’s right here. He finds it difficult to be too mad because she’s playing with his collar and occasionally her fingertips touch his pulse point. 

“You are welcome.” She says enunciating each word and dropping her hand from his neck, she goes to move away but his hand in her pocket stops her. He’s hit with the whiplash almost as powerfully as he’s usually hit on patrol. But this hurts more. How he managed to forget she didn’t like him like that in the last 2 minutes he’ll never know. He assumes it’s in the way she kissed him, in the way she caressed his head, in the way she looked in his eyes. But, you know, he’s just guessing.

He’s trying to figure out how he possibly went from feeling on top of the world with her merely touching him, to feeling the embarrassment seeping out of his pores. She doesn’t like him, she fucks him on occasion when she feels like it. Yeah occasionally he catches her looking at him for a beat too long, but she’s never done anything about it. 

She’s looking at him like she knows his feelings towards her have changed like she’s about to laugh in his face at the mere thought that they might be anything other than people who sleep together. 

“I didn’t need you to do that. We aren’t together.” He knows he’s being harsh, but he can’t help the humiliation he feels at Brad calling him out on being single, knowing MJ felt pity for him. He knows she’s going to be hurt by what he’s saying but he’s blinded by the fact that he’s in love with her, and she doesn’t love him back. 

“I mean, we’re not even friends. I just fuck you.” He huffs out a humourless laugh, closing his eyes already regretting what he said. He’s convincing himself she won’t care, would say something similar in the same situation. It’s Michelle, she doesn’t care about him enough to care if he hurts her feelings. He’s sure she feels absolutely nothing towards him anyway. 

He misses the hurt that flashes in her eyes.

“Fuck you, Parker.” His eyes snap open at the tone in her voice and he desperately tries to think of some way to make this better, but she’s already out the door before he remembers how to speak. 

**Michelle**

She hasn’t spoken to Peter since the coffee shop debacle and honestly, she’s still so fucking confused. Is that not what people do? Get people out of sticky situations? She knew he was uncomfortable, he had all the trademark uncomfortable Peter qualities. Ugh, fuck him. She still wants to, obviously. His arms. 

She doesn’t really feel like going out tonight, but Cindy begged her and she’s a sucker so she’s about to enter the house of someone she doesn’t know, a friend of Cindy’s from her class, dressed in her favourite ‘I don’t want to be here’ outfit. Just so happens to be the tightest leather jeans she owns and Spiderman crop top. What? Sue her, she looks hot. If she thinks Peter might be here and she can tell him to get fucked and watch him regret being an assole to her all at once? A win. 

Cindy pulls her into the house and immediately ditches her for the drinks stand. Rolling her eyes she scopes out the place. There’s a cute looking girl in the corner she might spend most of her night talking to. She’s about to walk over when she gets stopped by someone she vaguely recognises from campus.

“Michelle!” he shouts in her face, does she know him? All she can really figure out is that he smells like a distillery. 

“Er, hi?” She's not usually in the practice of talking to people she doesn’t want too, but she can’t see anyone she knows. 

“You’re so fucking hot, come sit with me.” He slurs while getting way to close to her. 

“I’m good thank you.” She wants to tell him to fuck off, to leave her alone but somehow he has her backed up against a corner and she’s not sure how to get anyone’s attention over the sound of the music. She can barely hear herself think over the blood pulsing in her ears. She’s scared. He’s got a good few inches on her and at least 40 pounds. She tries to look around him but she can’t get anyone’s attention. 

Before she can think he’s dragging her away and she can’t get him off of her. Somehow in a room full of drunken college students, she’s the most terrified she’s ever been. If only superheroes were secretly in their 20s. Where the fuck is Spiderman when you need him? He’s on her top but she really fucking needs him to be right in front of her. 

While she’s determining how to get out of this situation, he’s pushing her into a room and locking the door. Just as the door closes she swears she sees Peter but only manages to whisper his name, completely cased in fear. Her inner monologue is trying to decide if she should fight her way out, knowing she won’t win - or to try another tactic. 

He has his hand gripped on her upper arm and the scream that’s lodged in her throat doesn’t have the time to come out because someone’s broken the lock on the door. She can’t see who it is because the drunken prick is in her view. 

“Get the _fuck_ away from her.” Peter? She’s never heard him sound so angry - he never seemed like the type to have this side of him buried away. She’s insanely grateful that he does.

“Dude, go away-” before he even has a chance to finish his sentence, Peter has his hand off of her and backed into the opposite wall. 

“I said, stay away from her.”

“Fucking freak.” He replies but looks almost as scared as she feels. 

“What’s your name?” 

“Wh- what, why?”

“I’m giving it to the Dean. What is your name?” He says enunciating every word. She tries to block out his reply, hoping to forget this ever happened. A hand goes up and down so quickly Michelle’s not entirely sure anything happened until the guy slumps to the floor. 

**Peter**

He hasn’t felt a rage like this before. The overwhelming need to protect her. The anger and helplessness he felt when he caught her watery gaze and heard her whisper his name. It only took him about 30 seconds to get through the door and have him knocked out but it felt like hours. He still has his back to her, hoping selfishly she’s using this time to hide her emotions like she usually does. He’s not sure how to help her, not when she must still hate him from the last time they spoke. God, why was he such an asshole. 

He turns around and he’s devastated by the way she’s clearly trying so hard to keep it together. He doesn’t know what to say, what to do. He can see her hands trembling, but would she want him to touch her? He has no idea. So he looks away, missing the way her hands reach out for him. By the time his gaze is back on her, she’s got her arms wrapped around herself. 

“Is he - is he okay?” she asks, voice studier than he’s expecting. 

“Yeah, I just knocked him out - he’ll be fine,” he replies, seeing her bite her lip. Not in the way he’s used too.

“Are you - did he hurt you?” She shakes her head in response but he can see her stroking her upper arm and he feels murderous again.

“Can you take me home, please?”

“Yeah, of course.”

He opts to take a cab to her place because he’s not sure he could deal with the 30-minute walk. He rambles at the best of times around her, let alone when she hates him for the second time and had a traumatic experience. So he lets her get in the cab first and slides in the back with her, leaving a gap in the middle. They’ve only been in the cab a couple of minutes, Peter fielding the polite conversation from the driver and giving him her address. 

He settles back into this seat and chances a glance at Michelle, she’s staring out the window with her arms still wrapped around herself and he wants to help. Why can’t he help her? He’s spent the last few months documenting everything about her, he knows how she likes her coffee; which tea she wants depending on the time of day; whether or not she wants him to leave the crosswords for her. So why can’t he figure out how to help her now? Watching her try to slyly wipe her eyes he reasons that he needs to _do_ something.

He slides into the middle seat, and when she doesn’t push him away he puts his arm around her. He lets out a deep breath he didn’t know he’d been holding when she immediately leans into him. Engulfing her in a hug he wishes he gave her 15 minutes ago, days ago when she helped him in the coffee shop, he kisses her forehead. 

“It’s okay, you’re okay.” He says over and over again, trying to convince himself as much as her. She’s here with him, she’s okay, she’s going to be okay. She moves around in her seat and he’s nervous she’s going to shove him off, but she unfolds her arms from between them and hugs him back. He’s overcome with feeling for her, feeling he’s trying hard to file away in a part of his brain he doesn’t look in. He’s too scared that he'll profess his love for her in the back of a cab. 

She’s silent until they get to her apartment, but her hand never leaves his. The second the door closes he’s nervous as to how long he should stay. She’s not drunk, pretty sure she wasn’t drugged or anything. He only has to think about it for a few more seconds because Michelle has spun around and backed him into the wall, rands running all over his chest as she kisses him. 

“Em-” he tries to say but she slips her tongue into his mouth and he’s momentarily stupefied. Her shaky hands trying to under his shirt buttons bring him back into the moment. She’s scared, and he can’t take advantage of her like this. He doesn’t want to - would never want to do anything she’s not a hundred percent up for. 

Using his strength to pull her arms away he can see the hurt in her eyes - he wants to take it away, but not like this. 

“Come on, let’s go to sleep,” he says rubbing his thumbs over her increasingly fast pulse point. 

“If you’re not going to fuck me you can leave.” He _knows_ her now. Has spent the last few months desperately trying to catalogue everything about her. So he knows what she looks like when she’s nervous. He knows that she pushes people away to see if they’ll stay. He knows she knows that’s unhealthy because she told him. She trusted him. 

“I’ll just sleep on the floor okay? I’m really tired and I don’t think I’ll make it back without passing out. Is that okay?” He watches the anger melt away, leaving behind something worse. He misses how her eyes shine with happiness when she reads an unexpectedly cute scene in her book, or when a toddler smiles at her, or when he pretends he can’t finish the crossword without her and he wants to bring it back. 

He watches as she nods her head and strips her jeans and bra off, leaving her Spiderman crop top on. He wishes tonight didn’t end this way, that he wasn’t an asshole last week. He wants to tease her about being a fan. 

“Em - you need to take your makeup off. Remember that one time you got annoyed because you fell asleep and stained your pillow?” He says sitting at the edge of her bed. He hears her grunt and sniff and it breaks his heart. 

He quickly pops to the bathroom to grab what he hopes is makeup taking off equipment. He returns with a flannel and a bowl of water - what? Some of those products looked intense and he doesn’t wanna take her skin off. Can’t risk damaging her face, it’s precious. 

“Baby-”

“Mmmnot baby.” She says with a kick somewhere under the covers that makes his heart thump.

“Sorry.” He flushes in embarrassment but still needs to get her makeup off so he attempts again.

“Can you look at me, sweetheart?” Shit. She doesn’t attempt to kick him this time though so he takes that as a win. She does turn over and God she’s beautiful. 

“Hey.”

“Hi, Pete.” She says as if she’s embarrassed for her outburst before - he’d never blame her for that. She can act however she likes. 

“Close your eyes and go to sleep okay, I got you.” She does and he attempts to take her makeup off, which apparently requires more than water and flannel but he has what he has. 

When most of the makeup appears gone - although her eyes stay ringed black and he’s not sure how to get it off? Why is there so much on there? - he kisses her forehead and goes to make a bed on the floor next to her. He drifts into sleep when he hears her breathing level out.

* * *

The clock on the bedside table reads 4 am when he hears Michelle stirring from her place on the bed. 

“MJ?” he says rubbing his eyes. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” she replies, clearly lying. “I’m - I just can’t sleep that’s all.” He hears her move around, thinking that maybe getting up to get some water or use the bathroom. Instead, she walks around him and lies down next to him on his makeshift bed. 

“Hi.”

“Hi.” He says lifting the duvet over her so she’s not cold. She shuffles closer to him, so close her arm is brushing his. He lifts his arm, an offer if she wants it to not be alone - he doesn't want to be. She smiles at him and moves so her head is laying on his chest, as he uses his free hand to stroke her upper arm. The one he saw the beginnings of a bruise on before the lights went out. He kisses her on the forehead, more for him than for her. 

“Thank you.” She says while running her fingers along the sleeve of his top. He feels like he’s in the twilight zone like anything could happen. Like he could tell her how he wants to do nothing but look at her for the rest of his life. Like, she might say it back. He strokes her face, inwardly berating himself because what is she, a cat? He kisses her nose because she’s right here.

“For before, I didn’t - I don’t-”

“I’d do anything for you.” 

“Yeah?” She replies looking all too soft. He’s only seen this look on her a few times and it makes his chest feel funny every time.

“Yeah, of course. If you’re ever in trouble, or ever need anything, call me okay? I’ll be right there. I won’t let anyone hurt you.”

“Okay,” she says and it’s so quiet he can barely hear it over the sound of his heart beating. Missing how hers is erratic too. He watches as she closes her eyes and rests her head back on his chest. He’s running his fingers lazily up and down her back as she says, “I’ll protect you too. If you want.”

“Huh? What from?”

“I don’t know-” she yawns and he can hardly contain himself from spilling out all of the reason that he loves her “-you can protect me and I’ll protect you.” She says lightly gripping his shirt and his heart aches for her.

“Yeah, okay.” He says as he presses a kiss to the top of her head. 

**Michelle**

She’s out of her comfort zone with the feelings she has for Peter. When he took her home the other night she couldn’t have felt safer and surrounded with love. She can’t remember exactly what was said in the middle of the night, but she’s sure she embarrassed herself. He didn’t mention anything the next morning. 

Still, it’s been four days since she’s seen him and she misses him. They’ve texted back and forth slightly but she misses his voice - should she call him? It’s like 11 pm so she’s pretty sure he’d be awake, he often replies to text in the early hours of the morning. Before she chickens out she gets her phone and dials. 

“Hello?” He says slightly breathlessly and like he has no idea who’s calling him. Does he not have her number saved? Rude. 

“Hi -” she goes to say it’s Michelle, but she pauses because she’s embarrassed. She’d recognise his voice anywhere. But then again she has his number saved and wouldn’t sound confused if he called her. 

“Em?” Oh. 

“Yeah, hi.”

“Are you okay?” Well, yeah technically. She should have thought of a reason to call before calling. Just saying I missed your voice to someone who wouldn’t say the same back makes her feel silly. 

“Yeah, I just - I missed your voice.” Dammit. She scrunches her face and contemplates hanging up on him and then ghosting him for the rest of time. 

“You miss me?” And the way he asks makes her think that maybe it wasn’t a bad idea to pick up the phone. Smiling as she says, “yeah - just a little bit though.”

“Yeah?” He says as if he can’t get enough of her. Maybe they can do an entire call just saying different versions of ‘yes’ down the phone at each other. She’s smiling stupidly into her phone and she’s unreasonably glad she call-

“Who’s that, kitten?” Comes a flirtatious voice that does not belong to Peter.

“Go away!”

“Oh baby, come on. Who are you talking to? Another girlfriend?”

“Felicia-” another? She hangs up and throws the phone so quickly that it hits the floor before the tears even have a chance to reach her cheeks. Fuck she’s such an idiot. He’s nice to everyone. He told her in no uncertain terms that he didn’t want anything serious when he asked her to be fuck buddies. He shouted at her in a coffee shop not long ago when she was being kind. She knew this, so why is she so shocked when it’s in front of her face? It’s always been abundantly clear. So he was nice to her at the weekend when she was almost attacked. That’s the bare minimum. 

There’s a lump in her throat the size of her fist and she hates it. Furiously scrubbing at her eyes like it’s going to take any of the pain anyway and she hears a knocking at her window. Her heart flips and she’s suddenly terrified. She’s six floors up. There’s another knock and she doesn’t know what to do. She can’t call Peter, she threw her phone across the room and he’s with his girlfriend. The thought makes her heart feel like it’s falling from her chest. 

“MJ.” Peter? She runs to look out her window and can’t see Peter, but she can see Spiderman. Huh. Opening the window slightly, she asks if he needs help and he whips his mask off. Oh. 

“Peter.”

“Hey, can I come in please?” She must make some kind of movement that suggests yes he can because he is. 

“She’s not my girlfriend.”

“That’s what you wanna start with?” she says looking him up and down, taking in the suit. 

“Yeah. Yes. I mean, I’m Spider-man as well, but she’s not my girlfriend. I don’t have one.”

“Okay.” Ouch. Yes, it’s unreasonable but it hurts all the same. 

“Okay. Erm, I have to go now, but I wanted you to know.”

“Right.” He goes to raise his arms as he might hug her, but he drops them before she has a chance to move. Is he upset with her? She again doesn’t have the chance to ask because as quick as he came, he’s gone. 

**Peter**

He needs to get back to the stakeout, but he keeps fumbling his webs because she was _crying_ , and she looked hurt. And it was his fault. 

“Parker, what’s your ETA?” Comes through his comms. 

“Er, like 3 minutes. I think.”

“Shit, we’ve got it here. Don’t worry.”

“What - no, I can. I’m on my way back.” He says breathless, unable to focus on anything other than the fact he made her cry. 

He hears a sigh down the line and an admission that they need him and he feels guilty for a whole other reason. 

“Get your head in the game, Parker.” And they hang up. 

It’s true, he needs to focus on Spider-man. He can’t be running out on stakeouts because he thinks his not girlfriend is mad at him. She could have been crying about anything, right? Yeah, she said she missed him, and fuck he misses her all the time, but Spider-man is important. People could die while he was out. It’s not like Michelle is as into him as he is her. She’s probably just upset they haven’t had sex in a while.

He’s mad at himself for thinking that way about her, knowing that truly she only ever lets people in that she trusts. But that doesn’t matter, she knows who he is now and that means she’s in danger. He recklessly told her who he was because he heard the gasp of sadness before she hung up the phone. He didn’t mean to. He just can’t think around her, or when he’s thinking about her, or when she has any emotion. 

Spider-man is important, he knew he’d be making sacrifices when he decided to put the suit on. But he’s never forgiven himself for failing with Ben, knowing that truly, he can’t be blamed for every bad thing that’s ever happened. But usually, Ben would tell him that - and he can’t, he’s not here, he wasn’t saved. He can’t even bear the thought of something happening to Michelle, let alone it being his fault. Truly he understands that he should be allowed to be safe and happy, and that he can protect her, but what if? He decides as he swings off to see if anyone died because of his stupidity that he should end it with Michelle. 

* * *

It’s been a week since he showed up at her window and she hasn’t outed him to the world so he’s taking that as a very small win. Truly he knows that she never would, she could hate him and she’d never tell anyone. He loves that about her. 

What he doesn’t love is attempting to ghost her. It’s only been a week and he’s felt like garbage since the first time he ignored her call. Or the time he gave monosyllabic responses to her texts. He knows he’s hurting her, can tell by the way she makes up random excuses to talk to him. Asking him things that he knows she knows or could google. 

His heart hurts right now when he gets a text from her that says, ‘I won’t tell anyone - even if you want to stop talking. Just tell me.’ He feels like a prick because he knows she has issues with abandonment - so really he should just be a man and tell her. Tell her he can’t be with her because he’s petrified of how much he loves her, knowing that while she might like him it’s not the same. He could get her killed. 

But he misses her. He misses her so much he can barely sleep. Tossing and turning at night thinking about all the ways she makes the world better. How he’s barely even scratched the surface with how much she has to offer - how much she’d love him if he let her. 

He’s thinking about it as his phone lights up, a call from Michelle. He doesn’t deserve her, he never will - but he decides he should end things face to face. Or well, over the phone because he’s a coward who can’t bear to see the hurt in her eyes. The way he knows she’ll think it’s something to do with her instead of his desire to not see her killed. 

“Hi, MJ.”

“Peter,” she seems shocked he answered, and it hurts, but it’s fair. 

“MJ, I-”

“I got the internship.” She says and she sounds ecstatic and he’s so happy for her. 

“Of course you did! God, you’re amazing, Michelle. Of course, they wanted you. Who wouldn’t want you?” He closes his eyes at his mislip and the ramifications of what this will mean when he tells her he wants to call it off. 

“Huh, yeah - I guess.” The hesitation in her tone hits him in the gut. He can’t do this over the phone, he’s the worst superhero. He doesn’t deserve the title. He’ll have to do it over text or leave a note. He can’t see her and be trusted to go through with it. Knowing it’s selfish to want to keep her, when she can get hurt. The world deserves Michelle Jones much more than he does. 

“Did you tell Cindy yet?” It’s a change of conversation that she’ll pick up on, but he hopes she’ll let it slide anyway. She’s the smartest person he knows - she must know what he’s going to do. It hurts almost as much as the fact that he has to do it. Knowing she’s waiting for him to make a decision. 

“No - you’re the only one I really wanted to tell -” she says quietly, he hears her take a deep breath and feels a familiar burning sensation behind his eyes.

“I’ve gotta go.” He says and hangs up the phone. Taking a seat he follows her lead taking a deep breath. Fuck. Fuck, he’s ruined this and he’s still not entirely sure why. Spider-Man is dangerous, he knows that. He knows he should keep her away. But God, he gives up so much to help people, to save people - he wants, he needs someone as well. He wants it to be Michelle. 

He’s up and out the door quicker than he can quantify, unsure if he even locked the door. Oh well, doesn’t matter, someone could steal everything he owns and it wouldn’t compare to how he’d feel if he lost Michelle. 

**Michelle**

Well, fuck him then she thinks as her heart fills with lead. She can barely breathe she's so mad at herself for thinking this would end any other way. But fuck it hurts.

The sadness turns into anger and she needs to vent. So she sends a quick text to Harry who she knows is only a floor below her. 

MJ: Come up dickhead.

Harry: Wow, Michelle. What a way to greet an old friend. 

Harry: Wine?

MJ: Please.

Harry: Gimme two. 

She hears him let himself in from her pity party on the couch. 

“MJ, please get a grip if someone hasn’t died.” She hears him say with absolutely no decorum, she’s missed him. She still flips him off from behind her pillow. 

“Okay, out with it.” He says sitting down on her feet. 

“Ugh, I’m in love and it’s awful.” She tries to say with the usual nonchalance but Harry knows her - is the only person other than Peter than she’s ever truly let in. 

She can hear his eyebrows raise from her nest so she lowers her pillow and watches as his eyes soften at her puffy face. 

“Let me guess-” his words sound harsh but he’s soothing them by rubbing her feet “-friends with benefits are no longer working for you.” She shakes her head in response, trying to keep the tears from making an appearance. 

“He doesn’t feel the same?”

“I thought so - but I’m not sure. I’ve been _trying_ , like actively trying to talk to him you know. I’m shit at communication but I really want it to work with him-” she says looking down and pulling a thread of the pillow she’s using to shield her heart, it doesn’t work, she can already feel it breaking “-but he doesn’t, I don’t think he thinks I’m worth it.”

She watches as the pillow changes to a darker red, stained with her tears and she hears Harry get up and the clinking of glasses. He’s back and has the glasses poured by the time she’s convinced herself that tear ducts are for losers. 

“Michelle. You’re beautiful, you’re funny, you’re relentlessly kind.” He says while handing her a glass of wine. 

“I love you, anyone would be silly not too.” He whispers the last part as if it’s a secret just for them. 

“Shut up.” 

“Now, go get changed and I’ll make you come later.” She hits him as she gets up but ultimately forgives him for his crass attitude. Neither of them comes from particularly emotional functional households but they’ve tried to work through it together. 

On the way to the bedroom, she hears the door knock and Harry waves her off. 

When she returns to the living room she sees Harry looking dumbstruck and with a bunch of flowers. 

“Hot date?”

“Er - I might have fucked up.” He says uncharacteristically sombre. 

“What?” She’s nervous because the flowers are black Dahlias, and there is only one person in the world that would know she’d like those. 

“Harry-”

“Okay, so some guy came to the door?-” she watches him gulp “-and looked a bit shell shocked when I opened the door, kinda like a puppy?” Oh no. 

“And he asked where you were, and I very jokingly said- something inappropriate-” she hears him mumble something about sex.

“Harry!”

“You know how I get in uncomfortable situations, MJ! I’m sorry. He threw these at me and ran.” She can’t be too mad at him, they’re both fuck ups with emotional situations. 

“It’s okay - I’ll just talk to him later.” She says sitting back on the couch, nervously biting her nails. 

“MJ, you can go now - it’s okay.” She rolls her eyes at his reply. He did hang up on her and has been off with her all week, she needs a little time to complain to her friend. So she pats the seat next to her and asks how his training to take over the company is going. 

**Peter**

God, how could he be so stupid? Why would he think someone like her would wait for him to sort his shit out? He’s been unfair and cruel all week, he’s hardly surprised she’s moved on with some handsome tall guy. Just because he’s not surprised doesn’t mean it hurts any less. 

He’s surprised by how much it hurts when moments ago he was trying to convince himself to break things off with her - before he had the chance to properly ask her to be his girlfriend. But it feels as though a hole has been punched through his chest, he’s heard that expression somewhere before and can’t explain how accurate it is. He’s had life-threatening injuries that hurt less than this. 

He goes to call Ned to rant and try to get it out of his system, but he sees a bar across the street and decides to hell with it. He can’t get drunk easily, but he’ll try if it helps the burning sensation that’s been sitting behind his eyes since last week.

He can’t remember how long he’s been sitting here, throwing drinks back before she comes over to ask him how he’s doing. It’s dark out, so he assumes it must be at least eight in the evening. Perfect time to take someone home. 

“Wanna get out of here?” He says as she asks him how his week has been. He’s not sure if she said her name and he missed it, or if she’s out for the same reason he is. She looks different enough to the one he’s trying desperately not to think about, that he may be distracted for a whole fifteen minutes. He needs that. 

“Yeah, alright.” He grabs her hand as she gets off the stool, annoyed at the fact she loops her arm through his. He vaguely remembers asking her if she wants to come to his before he has her against the wall outside the corridor to his apartment. He’s trying to figure out if they could do it out here - terrified that he’ll break down taking someone that isn’t Michelle into his place. Knowing he’d feel her presence there - God he misses her. Even with his tongue down someone else's throat, she’s all he can think about. He wishes she was here. 

“Sorry, can I squeeze past?”

  
“Michelle?” He says spinning his head around, his hands still on the other girl’s waist - her hands still against his neck. 

He watches her face show all the classic signs of a surprised MJ, then tears spring into her eyes and his throat feels thick and watches as she drops a pizza box on the floor next to him. 

“Michelle, wait,” he says grabbing her wrist and she spins around and it feels as though he’s been punched in the chest because she’s hurt.

“It’s - it’s not what it looks like.” He says knowing full well what it looks like, and knowing she’s not an idiot. She’s very far from an idiot, he’s an idiot. One that doesn’t deserve her. 

She laughs humorlessly, “So your tongue wasn’t down her throat?” and he gulps trying to figure out the best way around this before she continues, “She’s cute”.

“You can’t be mad right? I mean, you were doing the same thing earlier, right?” He says, almost pleading that he’s correct. That he hasn’t monumentally fucked this up. He continues when she doesn’t answer him, looking slightly confused. “You know, when I dropped those flowers off, and some tall, practically disfigured guy answered the door.” 

“Harry?” The name of his arch-nemesis is Harry, good to know.

“He’s my friend, I’ve told you about him before - he’s just visiting.” It’s the worst thing she could have said. It would hurt less to know she was sleeping with someone else, that she might not like him at all, than it does to see the look in her eyes that he put there. The tears that were welling at the corners of her eyes are flowing down her face now and she’s wringing her hands like she does when she’s sad and doesn’t want anyone to know. He knows because she’s let him in because she trusted him and he’s fucked it up.

“Em, I’m sorry.” 

He watches her wipe the emotion from her face, inhale deeply and say,

“Why? We were only ever fucking anyway, right?” He knows she doesn’t mean it, he knows she’s protecting herself and it hurts all the same. “It didn’t mean anything, so, no harm no foul right?” She continues before he has a chance to say she’s wrong, to say it means everything to him, that she means everything to him.

“Probably best to stop now. I’m not in it to share - was fun though. God, I’m such an idiot... See you around, Parker.” And he doesn’t know how to fix it. So he watches her go. Sinks to the floor when he hears her gasps for air halfway down the stairs like she’s been holding her breath, trying to hide her emotions from him.

“Dude.” The girl says, he jumps, forgetting she was still here. “Just tell her you love her.”

“What? I don’t - I don’t love her, we just have sex, you know sometimes.” She rolls her eyes so hard he’s surprised they ever came back down. 

“Look, I don’t know why you were in the bar looking like a kicked puppy when apparently you could have been with her. I don’t care either before you start.” He was about to start. He needs to talk to someone. 

“Clearly you are dancing around something and let me tell you, girls don’t like that. So just tell her.” She says walking down the stairs. 

“Oh, and if she hates you, which she probably will, tell her to call me.” Hate him? Is she going to hate him? He used to think she hated him and he didn’t care, now he’s not entirely sure he’ll survive. 

Picking himself and his heart off of the floor, he goes to grab the pizza she dropped in her haste to get away from him. Opening the box he lets out a sad gasp, half his favourite, half hers. It’s insane how much a heart can hurt without someone physically dying. He shouldn’t have jumped to conclusions, but he’s always been sure there’s no way he could deserve Michelle. It makes sense that she was with someone else. 

**Michelle**

She’s being dragged out again, Cindy basically pleading at her to stop moping. They’re at a random house party and the ritual of walking in and being ditched by Cindy has remained. It’s not like she truly minds, Cindy is one of her best friends, and she’s in her ‘I wanna sleep with whoever I please’ phase. But she has been ditched, and if she’s in the mood to go home with someone she needs to be significantly more buzzed than she is right now. Trying to lace her heartbreak with tequila long enough to be a functional human instead of the depressed pile of skin she’s been for a fortnight. 

Walking over to the makeshift bar she sees him. Fuck. She’s unprepared. Spiderman’s barely been on the news in the two weeks since she left him with another girl in the stairwell. She doesn’t know why she’s shocked he’s in front of her as if there was a time over the last fortnight when he wasn’t the only thing on her mind. 

“Hi,” he says like he’s just as shocked she’s here.

“Parker.” She has a handle on this. She’s _not_ pining. His face drops at her tone but she perseveres. 

“Having a good time? Where’s Cindy?” 

“Er sure, she’s-” 

“Em, MJ! I’m going home with - oh cute!” Cindy states pointing to Peter, “take him home, he’ll help you get over Parker.”

“Cind. Text me when you get home okay?” she replies trying to shake the burning she can feel at the back of her eyes. The way she knows when she turns around he’s going to look broken. 

“Course baby, I’m staying at Abe’s tonight so” and she unhelpfully winks at her. She assumes she knows him because they’ve only been here for about 5 minutes. 

“Okay, thanks, bye!” She all but growls out. Knowing really it’s not her friend’s fault, but she is barely keeping it together. She’s wanted to jump his bones the second she saw him, wants to text him all the time to see what he’s doing, goes to call him when she sees something about Spiderman online. She misses him. She really fucking misses him. 

She waits for Cindy to leave and then she straightens her shoulders to turn back around, but he’s looking anywhere but her. It hurts as much as it helps. 

“I’m gonna head out but it was - it was good to see you.” She hears herself saying, no wobble in her voice. 

“Oh- oh okay. Yeah makes sense.” She hovers for a second, unsure of how to end this. 

“Okay, bye.” She raises a hand in a lame attempt at goodbye and gets ready to sprint home.

“Wait, Michelle-” she spins around and he’s closer than she anticipated, she can smell his cologne and she’s dangerously close to touching him. “-I can walk you home if you want I mean? It’s super dark.”

She nods at him, thankful to not have to get home by herself, she’s a badass but also a realist. Having Spider-man with her can only help. But as she watches him go to put his hand on her lower back to then let it drop instead, she’s not sure what it’s supposed to help with. 

She walks a little bit in front of him because she’s cold and all she really wants to do is lean into him. He’d let her, she’s pretty sure. Instead, she wraps her arms around herself and picks up the pace. 

“Are you cold?” he says with so much concern she’s sure she must be turning blue, not slightly shivering. 

“No,” she rolls her eyes at herself and the fact that obviously, her teeth had to chatter at the same time. She can hear him taking his jacket off and her eyes are already stinging. She doesn’t need this. To be cloaked in the clothing that will smell of him, not when he’s so close. She still has a hoody of his that she wears more often than not, but he’s never around for her to do anything about it. 

She doesn’t have the brainpower to tell him she doesn’t need his jacket because she glances over as he’s taking it off and he’s tense and hot and she hates him. She mutters thanks when he puts it over her shoulders. Barely keeping her breathing even when his fingers trace the nape of her neck as he lifts her hair out. 

“Haven’t seen you around- like on the news or anything” she quickly clarifies when she watches his eyes light up. 

"Oh yeah, just haven't felt up to it. Taking a break." she watches him wring his hands and is once again struck at how badly she wants to touch him. To forgive him. To tell him she got his texts and she understands. But it wouldn't be true. Sure, she understands where it all went wrong. But she's almost as hurt at him thinking she could do that, as she is that he managed to do that. He's all she thought about. All she still thinks about.

"That's good. Don't want Spidey to be burnt out, right," she says smiling at him accidentally.

"Yeah," he replies with a tone she knows means he's thinking about kissing her. When he looks at her eyes instead of the floor she quickly averts her gaze. 

"Are you excited about the job? Monday, right?"

It's pathetic how hard her heart thumps at the fact he remembers, it's only been two weeks. But she's convinced herself she meant nothing to him, she can't have.

"Monday, yep."

"You ready?"

"Course, Parker."

"Got your mug?" she whips her head round to look at him when he asked, this time her heart borderline stops at how he remembers this fact. She can't have told him more than a few weeks into their, whatever their thing was. She can't talk about her Dad at the best of times, and she was shocked then, like she is now, that she decided to tell him about it one day.

"No," she says far too breathless. She'd try and hide it but what's the point? He's Spiderman. And she's so in love with him.

"No? Michelle Jones, not prepared?" She rolls her eyes at him but it's fond. She knows he knows that he knows her.

"Well, it has to be good you know? Like I want people to see it and be jealous. So it can't just be any mug!" He laughs with her and it's her favourite sound. She misses him so much.

"What's any mug?" He says moving closer to her to bump her shoulder with his. It's always a little too gentle to actually move her as if he's scared he could hurt her.

"Hmm, like just a pretty one or something. I want it to stand out, it's a big deal, Pete! It's the first thing people are going to notice about me." She's practically walking sideways so she can talk to him properly.

"That's not the first thing they're going to notice, Michelle," he says wistfully. It's a good thing they're coming up to her apartment or she'd do something reckless. Something she doesn't think she can come back from. Yes, he's explained and apologised in texts, but she's right here, in front of him and he hasn't said anything.

She's desperate to forgive him, she's just waiting for him to do something worth forgiving. 

**Peter**

Standing outside her apartment building, he watches her look at the door and then back at him as if she’s weighing something up. He hopes it ends in her inviting him in because he misses her. He misses her so much. The thought that she went out tonight to find someone to help her get over him hurts more than he can describe. Knowing that it would be worse if he saw it, so he knows how badly she must have been hurting last weekend. If she likes him anywhere near as much as he likes her. 

She squeezes her eyes shut and takes a deep breath, he can barely deal with the anticipation. But she moves to take his jacket off and he feels himself plummet, he’s lost her and he’d rather go back to not knowing whether or not she was going to call, over this finality. 

“Thanks for walking me home.” She says handing him his jacket. 

“Yeah, of course. Anytime.” He replies, voice breaking mid-sentence. Her hand brushes his as he takes his jacket back and he chances a look at her and she just - she looks so sad. He goes to lean forward and she shakes her head. So he aims higher and kisses her forehead with all the emotion he has. Hopes the regret he has seeps through her skin and into her brain. She wraps her arms around him and he throws his around her. 

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry Em.” He wants to say more. But he knows there’s no real explanation that he hasn’t told her over text already. Knowing he could have spent the whole walk home describing to her how he knows he's fucked up, how she's the only thing on his mind, how he loves her. But he doesn't want to put that pressure on her, not while it's dark and she has no other way to get home. He doesn't want to force her to listen to him, it seems like a trap. 

He needs to respect her decision, her reasoning, whatever she wants. She can have it. He wants to tell her he loves her, but it would be too painful for her to not say it back, knowing he wouldn’t deserve her love on the best of days. Knows she’d feel guilted into giving him another chance. 

Everything he needs is right here. She’s in his arms, head tucked under his chin and he wants to stay here, wrapped in her embrace for the rest of time. But he knows he can’t. He knows this is hard for her, that she wants to give in but she can’t. So he tries to make it easier. He places another kiss to the top of her head, breathes her in and tells her to go upstairs because she’ll get sick if she stays out here too long. 

She mutters thanks, wipes her eyes quickly and walks away. He watches her go until he can’t see her anymore until he sees her apartment light turn on. She took his heart with her. He decides she can keep it, it’s useless without her anyway. 

  
  


**Michelle**

Tuesdays are her least favourite day of the week. She’s contemplating how much she dislikes them as she walks up the stairs to her apartment. She spends the two minutes that it takes to be thankful that she’s out of breath because it means she's focused on breathing over the fact she misses Peter. 

She knows realistically she’ll get over it, they weren’t even together. She understands why he was out with the girl whose name she can’t even remember, but it doesn’t make it hurt less. She’d tried to explain to Cindy and Betty why she wasn’t giving him another chance, knowing that truly, on paper, he was guiltless and appeared to be suffering just as much as she was. She’s not sure why she’s sticking with it if she’s honest.

She’s annoyed at the fact he crept back into her mind as she heavily breathes at the end of the corridor leading to her apartment. There’s a bag in front of her door and she’s equal parts intrigued and scared. It is New York. She picks it up anyway and can see what looks like a gift inside so she’s less threatened. She opens the door, takes her coat off and hangs it on the hook while kicking her shoes off. Placing her bag on the kitchen counter she takes the gift out.

It’s badly wrapped, her favourite way to receive gifts. It’s wrapped in blue and red tissue paper and her heart beats faster when she thinks who it could be from. Tearing the paper off she sees a large white mug, with the words ‘Go get ‘em, MJ - Spidey’ painted on the side. She bites her lip to keep from smiling too hard, tears welling in her eyes at this gift. She spins it around a few times and sees a card inside the cup. 

She places the cup on the side and unfolds the note, ‘Hope your first day went well. I know you’ll have one already, but in case you don’t, happy work mug, MJ. - Peter.’ And on the back ‘P.S. I’ll always have your back.’

She tells herself to take the day to think it through before she does anything. She has her phone out and his number dialled in under 30 seconds. 

“Michelle?” She hears, along with the sound of wind and traffic. 

“Hey, Spidey - call me back when you’re on the ground.”  
  


“No, wait-” she does “-I’m on a rooftop now. Are you okay?”

“I got your gift.”

“Oh. Well, I thought you could use it when-”  
  


“I miss you.” She hears him let out a deep breath. She continues when he doesn’t say anything, “Can you come over after patrol?” Before she’s even finished her sentence she can hear he’s already swinging. 

“On my way, 2 minutes okay.” 

“Pete, you can-”

“Already coming, can’t stop me. I’m practically on the roof.” She laughs at the fact that he’s adorable and she can’t believe how much she loves him. “Mmmmk, window or door?”

“Door, I’m already changing, oop, hang on-” she does “-I’ve got clothes on now so I’ll just meet you at your door in liiiiiiike, now.” She hears him knock on the door. 

“Dork.” She says fondly as she walks over to answer. 

“Hey.” She says to the phone as she opens the door. He throws his phone somewhere in the direction of her sofa and brings his hand up to her face and kisses her. She lets her phone fall out of her hand and forgets to care if it breaks as she grabs fist fulls of his shirt. 

“I’m sorry,” he says between kisses and she shakes her head. He pulls his head back and looks like maybe he read this all wrong.

“It’s okay, it’s okay. I forgive you.” She replies running her thumb over the crease between his eyebrows. 

“Em-” she interrupts him with a kiss. Pulling back to check where he’s at she sees him looking at her with the adoration that should scare her, would have scared her, but all she does is smile at him. 

“You’re so beautiful.” He says smoothing some hair from her face and her grip on him never falters. “Look at you. God, I’m so lucky.”

“Kiss me.” He surges forwards, kissing her so softly and with such care, she feels so safe here. And then the kiss turns into something deeper, something filthier. He crouches down to grab her thighs and hoists her up to him, she immediately wraps her legs around his hips, arms bent around his neck. She can’t catch her breath and she’s not sure she’s ever been this turned on, “Peter, bedroom,” she manages to say between breaks for air and immediately going back to kiss him. 

**Peter**

He hums a yes down her throat and can’t get over how lucky he is to have her in his life, let alone like this. 

“Em.” She pulls her top over her head, assuming he can adjust his position and keep her upright - he can, and goes straight back to kissing him like he never spoke. Fuck he loves her. Loves the feel of her bare skin beneath his hands. 

“Baby-”

“Not your baby.” She says pulling his bottom lip with her teeth as he backs her into a wall. His tongue touches hers and he grinds against her, hands against her waist. Michelle is equal parts trying to take his top off and pull his hair and he’s not mad at either. 

“I missed you.” She says while successfully getting rid of his top, immediately hugging herself close to him. 

“I missed you. Fuck -” he pulls back to hold her face in his hand, hips thrust forwards slightly to hold her in place “-Em, I missed you.-” He can feel the lump in his throat growing larger the longer he looks at her but he needs her to know “-I’m sorry… I messed up so fucking badly and - I’ll never do anything to hurt you ever again I promise.”

“I know-” she says running her hands through his hair, down his neck to land on his chest “-I trust you.” He leans in to kiss her slowly, a promise, because he has more to say. She doesn’t seem to want to hear it though, because her tongue in his mouth lightly brushes the back of his lip and he all but growls at her. 

“Michelle-” he says in warning of something but he doesn’t know for what.

“Yeah, baby?”

“You know that’s a double standard and you don’t like double standards.” He says moving his hands under her ass to move her to the bedroom. 

“Mmmkay, I’ll stop calling you it then.” 

“God, I hate you.” He says laying her down carefully on the bed, laying over the top of her. 

“No, you don’t.” She replies tracing her finger around the outline of his face. 

“No-” he clears his throat, unshockingly overwhelmed with the feeling he has for her “-I don’t.” Sitting back up on his knees she follows him and he loves her. 

“Actually - I don’t hate you at all. Not even a little bit.” She looks at him like she knows what he’s about to say but she’s giving him the floor, she does reach for his hand though, and he gives it willingly, but drops his eyes to the bed. 

“Ever since - ever since I _very_ accidentally spilt drinks on you, there hasn’t been a day where you weren’t constantly on my mind-” he chances a look up at her and she’s smiling at him, like she loves him as much as he loves her and it spurs him on “-you’re everything to me. You have been for months honestly. And I know - I know I fucked it up-” she squeezes his hand mouths that she forgives him and he loves her.

“I love you. I love you wholly and completely, MJ. It makes me feel like I’m going insane and that I’m completely calm all at once. I know love is supposed to be scary, and I was terrified when I thought I might lose you, and there are numerous reasons why I should tell you to run - but nothing about physically being here, with you, has ever made me feel anything other than safe.” He pulls her hand so she tips forwards and he can kiss her, he’s missed her. He pushes her back against the mattress the second she reaches him and she hums in confusion but ultimately laces her arms around his neck like she knows he has her. 

Looking down at her he sees all the reasons he fights for a better world, all the reasons that make each mission worth it, all the motivation to go back out tomorrow, it’s her. It’s all for her. 

“Not to be dramatic-” she rolls her eyes but she’s still smiling so much he knows her cheeks hurt and he _loves_ her “-but I want to be with you for the rest of my life.”

“Pete-”

“I’m not proposing, Michelle don’t worry. I mean, I will. Give me exactly a month to write down all the ways I love you and then I’ll ask.” And she’s laughing at him and he makes a mental note to make that the first thing he loves. 

He leans in to kiss her soundly, whispering against her lips when he pulls back, “I love you. I’ll love you forever. I’ll buy you all the mugs you want, I promise.” It’s been at least ten seconds since he kissed her and he misses her. 

She pushes him so he flips onto his back and she straddles him, sitting upright. 

“I -” she starts, and he rubs her thighs because he knows this is hard for her and he selfishly wants her to tell him anyway - although he knows. She’d never have to say the words and he’d know, she shows him all the time. He’s so stupid to have missed it. 

“I feel like I should have a thing planned, but you make my brain feel funny - and I forget all the words despite being a literary genius - your words not mine.” She intertwines their fingers the next time his hands travel up her thighs. 

“But I love you. I just - I really love you. Is that okay?” She asks as if she’s still unsure, as if she’s not the most loveable person he’s ever met, will ever meet. He nods his head at her because he can’t remember how to form words. 

“Okay.” She says leaning down so he can embrace her when her face touches his chest she rests against his heart and whispers that she loves him over and over again. He gives her a minute because sometimes she needs a second to calm down and he’d never want to change her - he wants her to stay exactly as she is. 

She does come to meet him eventually, kissing his lips and he immediately deepens it pulling her closer to him with his hands behind her neck. She lies against him fully and he adores the way he can feel her from head to toe, the way she links her feet with his. 

“I’ll get better at saying it.” She says while they spend a good thirty seconds just staring at each other. 

“You’re perfect, Em. I know, okay? Even if you never say it again, I know. And I love you right back.” 

“I love you.” She says without pausing and he can barely take it, rushing forwards to kiss her again. 

“I wanna fuck you now though.” 

“Michelle, I am scandalised.” He replies while undoing his trousers. 

“Nerd. Lose the pants.” 

“You could ask me nicely, my love.” He says while standing to take his pants off. He takes his boxers off aswell, it makes sense. 

“Shut up.” She says breathless, and when he glances at her, she’s blushing and he loves her. 

“Lose your pants!”

“You could ask me nicely, baby.” She responds by stepping out of her trousers and underwear. He grabs her around the waist, pulling her flush to him and tells her she said she wouldn’t say that again. He’s joking, he just hopes he knows what she’ll choose instead. 

“Yes, sir.” And bingo. 

He pulls her to the mattress with him, laying her on her back, immediately working his way down her body leaving wet kisses along her chest. 

He’s not in the mood to tease today, maybe later, but right now he needs her. He’s missed her. He’s thinking back to the first time they were like this, and how much has changed. The sex has stayed pretty consistent, he felt safe with her from the get go. The only difference is now there’s so much about her that turns him on that he wasn’t aware of at the start - her mind, her kindness, her loyalty - that the extra stimulation isn’t really an issue anymore. 

He flicks his tongue over her clit and goes to bury his fingers in her when he remembers a specific act in their first encounter - 

“Fuck, Em - will you sit on my face?”

“Yes, sir.” _Jesus_. She responds as she immediately moves to give him space to lay down. She’s above his face before he’s even flat on the mattress and he can’t believe he got so lucky. 

“Hey, baby.” She says with a smirk, lowering herself onto his mouth when he goes to call her out. He can’t find it in himself to be that mad, not when she ghosts her hands up her body to play with her nipples. He can reach her from here, he loves playing with her, but she’s so sexy like this that he uses his hands for other things. Spanking her and simultaneously slipping a finger in makes her welp transform into a moan and he’s so fucking hard. 

Using his free hand to rub his dick, matching the pace she’s setting riding his face until she says, 

“Slower.” He’s confused because he knows how she loves it, what makes her call out his name, but he’ll give her whatever she wants. 

“Not me -” she moans as his finger increases it’s tempo again and takes one hand of herself to grab a fistful of his hair “-you, stroke yourself slower.”

“Em-”

“You’re Spider-Man don’t even.” She says slowly grinding her clit along his tongue, and fuck if she doesn’t know how to please him without touching him. Yes, in theory he should be able to do three things at once, he is Spider-Man but God, she throws him off guard. He let’s go off himself to focus solely on her, he needs to get her there. 

“Pete, wait-” he stops and looks up at her, as much as her hold on his hair will allow. Kissing the inside of her thigh and removing his fingers he waits for her to make the next move. He’d spend forever waiting for her. 

He pouts when he goes to move off him but chokes on nothing when she spins around and places her knees next to his shoulders again. 

“Is this okay?” She asks before she touches him. 

“Yes, Jesus _Fuck_ Michelle.” He responds grasping her thighs to pull her back down to his mouth, tongue fucking her the second she’s in reach. He wants her to touch him but if she can’t because she’s moaning too loud that’s fine as well. 

He ghosts a finger around her entrance and celebrates the way he knows she’s going to push herself back into him to get him where she wants him - she does. 

“Pete,” she says with a whine as she grapes the base of his dick. 

**Michelle**

Rubbing the pre-cum over the head of his dick, she leisurely strokes up and down waiting for him to buck up into her hand - he does. She licks a stripe from the base to the tip while he’s momentarily stupefied and therefore she can think without him sucking on her clit in the way that makes her toes curl. She takes the head into her mouth and smiles around him as she curses from behind her. 

Letting him go with a pop, she twists back to see him and says, 

“See, two things at once is not that hard.” Slowly still moving her hand up and down. 

“Em - fuck. You’re such an asshole. I love you so much.” She turns back around, kisses the tip of his cock, pushing down on him to stretch her mouth over his head, taking him as deep as she can before the choking takes hold. He’s trying not to thrust into her and she loves him. But she wants him to.

“Baby, fuck my mouth, please.”

“ _Jesus_ , Michelle.” But he does as she requests, and she can’t help the waves of pleasure that gives her. Knowing he trusts her to trust him, and she finds herself grinding on him at the same pace. 

He’s moaning without abandon into her cunt and she can barely keep her mouth on him, let alone a decent rhythm. He seems to notice and replaces his one finger slowly with two in a way that has her groaning onto his dick like it’s a microphone. 

He’s licking at her clit in the way the makes her eyes roll back, and she can feel her orgasm building. He pulls his fingers out and grabs her thighs to bring her flush to his tongue, moving her back and forth until she comes on top of him, shaking and then immediately collapsing next to him. 

“You didn’t -” she’s gasping for breath, thinking of how she can possibly lean back onto her arms to take him into her mouth the way she wants to “-you didn’t come.” 

“Baby, don’t-” She kicks his shoulder from her position, collapsed against his knees. 

“Not baby.” She watches him roll his eyes and bite his lip, both things he’s copied from her and she loves him. She can’t believe they got here. She knows she’s stolen his trademark heart eyes, but she doesn’t care - doesn’t think she’ll ever care if anyone knows how much she loves him. 

She wants everything with him, grocery shopping, holding hands, vacations when they can afford it, living together the second they can - she might bring it up soon. She wants to marry him, have children with him, grow old with him - and the best thing about it is she knows he wants the same with her. There’s no doubt in her mind. He’s got her back.

“What?”

“I love you.”

“I love you right back.”

**Author's Note:**

> I said don't look at me!!!!!  
> I don't know okay?
> 
> Come say hi on tumblr: i-lovethatforme


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